WHO has established a Commission on Macroeconomics and Health (CMH) to assess critically and, where appropriate, to extend the evidence base concerning the following topics:

the nature and magnitude of the economic outcomes (income and productivity growth, poverty reduction, and social protection) of investing in health;

the economics of incentives for research and development for drugs, vaccines and other technologies that address diseases primarily affecting the poor;

effective and equitable mobilization of resources (including reallocation of current public budgets) to finance control of major specific health problems of the poor and to develop and sustain health systems more generally;

health and the international economy, particularly trade-related issues;

costs and efficiency in use of
resources to improve health outcomes of the poor, including consideration of interventions and policies within and outside the health sector; and

development assistance and health (including consideration of efficiency in use of assistance oriented to improving health, debt relief, and external assistance for international public goods).

The CMH may add topics; and it may choose to exemplify its findings with disease-, country-, or regionally-specific analyses. It will draw on and contribute to ongoing initiatives elsewhere.

The CMH will provide analysis with a view to assisting WHO and the international community in their consideration of issues relating to health and development in low and middle-income countries. It is accordingly foreseen that the results of its work will be published by WHO and widely disseminated.

The composition of the CMH is intended to include macroeconomists from academia, governments, and agencies. It may, in addition, include a health economist, a public health specialist, a biomedical scientist and a current or former health minister. Members will serve in their personal capacities but those from governments or agencies may designate alternates for some meetings. The Director-General of WHO will appoint the Members and Chair of the CMH.

The CMH will complete its work by December 2001, unless the Director-General of WHO authorizes a later date.